


Observer Effect

by Gleennui



Series: Football Rivals [6]
Category: Glee
Genre: Alternate Universe, Coming Out, Gen, High School Football, M/M, alternate universe different schools, original character narration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-16
Updated: 2019-09-16
Packaged: 2020-10-19 16:34:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20660300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gleennui/pseuds/Gleennui
Summary: Kevin Sullivan knows it's not just a t-shirt.(An interlude to the Football Rivals saga)





	Observer Effect

**Author's Note:**

> You'll need to read the rest of this series for this interlude to make sense!

Kevin Sullivan isn’t the world’s smartest guy. He knows it; his parents know it; his teachers know it when they sigh all, “Mr. Sullivan, again?” every time they grade his tests. His sister knew it when she sat him down one day in fifth grade and silently handed him all her old cheat sheets from middle school. 

But he isn’t stupid, and he knows that, too, even if no one else realizes. He gets solid B-minuses, he can block the blind side, and he’s pretty sure he wants to sell insurance for a living, like his Uncle Paddy with the Desert Storm limp. Kevin isn’t worried about Harvard, or sweating the PSATs, and he’s pretty sure that makes him a hell of a lot smarter than most people he knows. 

Which is why he keeps his mouth shut about Noah Puckerman. 

The first time was a fluke--maybe some of that not-the-smartest coming out--because why wouldn’t he get it right away, otherwise? The t-shirt, and the weird early hour, and Kevin knows Puck doesn’t live out that far. Yeah, Kevin definitely was not-the-smartest that week, thinking Puck was a spy or some shit and telling Karofsky like they really had a sophomore running back James Bond at McKinley High. 

Puck’s face, though--Kevin saw it go white and scared-looking. Karofsky _is_ stupid, or close to it, which was and is lucky for Puck, because Kevin’s still not sure how anyone could have thought Puck wasn’t hiding something right then. He did make sure to distract Karofsky the rest of practice, because not-the-smartest still doesn’t mean “doesn’t learn his lesson,” and whatever and whyever Puck was keeping his own secret, Kevin wasn’t going to make the same mistake twice. 

The thing about Puck Kevin hadn’t realized until he stopped listening to Karofsky and started paying attention was that Puck _ cared_, and not just on the field. In fact, Kevin would admit to himself later when he thought about how much he’d missed, football was the least surprising part. Puck worked a hell of a lot harder in practice than Kevin or anyone on the o-line ever did. Kevin watched Puck map out routes over and over with Josh or Coach or sometimes by himself, while the rest of them spit sunflower seeds at each other or tried to pants Gardy. 

But then there was school. Kevin had figured a sophomore starter would shoot for minimum eligibility GPA, like most of the rest of them. Hell, Kevin had even been tempted a couple times, with his not-the-smartest brain and all. His Mom, Dad, sister, and Fr. Fitzpatrick would all murder him if he flunked out, though, and then say a whole decade of the rosary over his disappointing dead body, so he keeps an eye on his grades. 

Still, Kevin knows it’s easy to slip, and Puck didn’t seem different from the other guys until Kevin started catching him coming out of the library every day around when the sophomores have lunch. Puck didn’t seem like he’d been doing anything _but_ schoolwork every time Kevin saw him, which started to make sense when Kevin got an early ride in a few days after his first noticed the library lunches and almost tripped over Puck sitting on the floor, a textbook open on his lap. 

“Sorry, man,” Puck had said, shrugging. He didn’t look up. 

As the weeks crawled into the fall, Kevin checked more and more off his--admittedly kind of weird by now--mental list of Things Puck Really Cares About. Family? Yup. Puck talked about his sister’s piano lessons and making dinner for his mom. Hobbies? Puck brought a guitar to school at least once a week, even though Kevin knew there wasn’t a band or anything at McKinley. Religion? Kevin thought it was cool how he could sometimes see a yarmulke in Puck’s gym locker. 

If Kevin _were_ smarter, he probably would’ve figured out sooner how that all tied into the t-shirt, but he congratulates himself on still being probably the one guy on the team who did. As it was, he thinks he’s lucky they played Central Catholic Week 3, and not later. Because by halftime, Kevin knew why he was keeping his mouth shut. 

He didn’t see it at first, which Kevin thought meant maybe he was stupid, after all, because if the t-shirt secret didn’t have _something_ to do with Central Catholic, then this was some cryptography shit he wasn’t prepared for. 

In the second quarter, though, all of Kevin’s weird staring at Puck finally paid off in a way he still doesn’t think he would have predicted. It started with a kind of dirty hit on the Central QB --Hudson, Kevin remembered from last year, who was about eight feet tall--that laid him out flat. Coach hit the roof after the game about it, and now Beecher is sitting until November, but in the moment, all anyone was looking at was Hudson. Everyone except Kevin, of course, who was _still_ watching Puck. After all, a good detective knows you solve the mystery right when you’re supposed to be distracted. 

It’s a good thing Kevin was watching, too, because Puck looked like he was either going to cry to slug Beecher or maybe both. His jaw was clenched and his hands were squeezed into fists and he was...Kevin realized Puck was for real walking _into_ medical huddle around Hudson. 

Thinking back on it, Kevin’s pretty sure his jaw dropped like in a cartoon, because there’s no way Puckerman does anything coincidentally, and right then he was obviously all kinds of worried about someone he never even hinted he knew, let alone enough to be kneeling down next to the Central trainer and looking like someone stole his puppy. There was something there Kevin knew he wasn’t supposed to be watching, and he definitely wasn’t stupid enough to miss what it meant. 

For the first time since seeing the t-shirt, Kevin purposely looked away. 


End file.
